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"419" Scam – Advance Fee / Fake Lottery Scam

The so-called "419" scam is a type of fraud dominated by criminals from Nigeria and other countries in Africa. Victims of the scam are promised a large amount of money, such as a lottery prize, inheritance, money sitting in some bank account, etc.

Victims never receive this non-existent fortune but are tricked into sending their money to the criminals, who remain anonymous. They hide their real identity and location by using fake names and fake postal addresses as well as communicating via anonymous free email accounts and mobile phones.

Keep in mind that scammers DO NOT use their real names when defrauding people.
The criminals either abuse names of real people or companies or invent names or addresses.
Any real people or companies mentioned below have NO CONNECTION to the scammers!

Read more about such scams here or in our 419 FAQ. Use the Scam-O-Matic to verify suspect emails.

Click here to report a problem with this page.

 

 

Some comments by the Scam-O-Matic about the following email:

Fraud email example:

From: "ERIC WERLMANN" <ericwerlmann@klikni.cz>
Date: Tue, 27 May 2008 13:12:23 +0100
Subject: FROM ERIC WERLMANN


*Dear
Friend.



My name is Mr. Eric Werlmann,. Assistant Manager of South African Financial
Service Board (FSB) The Board has an Interest Generation Account which is
designed to get customers invest their money with Profitable Companies in
South Africa through their Deposits with the African Development Bank Group.
Most Expatriate who come into South Africa has also been encouraged by the
Home office to open account with us for this purpose.

The Deal I want to discuss with you is that I have here in my Branch 378
files which have been confirmed to belong to Foreigners who lived in South
Africa years back, opened account and gone back to their respective
countries without knowing about the Interests. I ,as assistant Manager is
under Obligation to transfer these funds to the home office account through
African Development Bank Group, since the customers are unreachable. This is
why I am sending this email to you.

I want you to partner with me, Let us use your contact / Bank details and
other information of yours to represent as the owner of two important files
that generated huge amount interest. I have concluded my search and
confirmed that the beneficiaries are not aware of the Interests since they
have withdrawn their Capital Investments and closed down their accounts with
our Board.

Be informed that they have withdrawn their money and closed these accounts
on the 4th of April 2007 from the information I have before me in their
respective files an Interest of 7.500,000.00 and 5,200, 000.00 the total
amount involved in these two accounts are 12,700,000.00 United States
Dollars . A 5% tax will be deducted according to the Law and the rest will
be transferred to your account.*

*Meanwhile, I have already submitted an approved end of the year report for
the year 2007 to my head office here Pretoria and they will never know of
this interest. I have since then, placed this amount on a Non-Investment
Account without a beneficiary with African Development Bank Group.

Upon your response, I will configure your name and address on our database
as holder of the Non-Investment Account. I will then guide you on how to
apply to the paying Bank for the Account Closure/ bank-to-bank remittance of
the funds to your designated bank account.

If you concur with this proposal, I intend for you to retain 30% of the
funds while 70% shall be for me. Do contact me by
mail:ericwerlmann1@jmail.co.za <mail%3Aericwerlmann1@jmail.co.za> Looking
forward to your immediate response Thanks *

*Mr.Eric Werlmann*

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